The Thank You Score: Improving CS & proving social ROI

The Thank You Score, what is it and why do you need to know about it?

The Thank You Score is a way of measuring the happiness of your customers and success of you customer service efforts on social media. Customers are turning to social media more and more to have their questions answers and queries resolved. In a bid for efficient and personalised service, many brands are dedicating entire Twitter handles to customer services and inviting users to use Facebook Messenger as a way of getting in touch. Through having these services inside a platform users are already familiar with, brands are already improving and streamlining the customer experience.

Defining ROI within social media is a question that comes up often (blog post on this to come!). It seems to be an industry wide debate and one which requires strategy and knowledge to understand. However, by identifying your KIPs it helps to define your return on time and money. People often assume, that to prove ROI there must be a return of currency. However, this is not always the case. An understanding of your KPIs throughout any strategy or social project will enable you to define and prove an ROI.

For example, if one of your KPIs or goals is to drive more enquiring users to your social platforms instead of your customer service phone line, you might use the Thank You Score to measure your return. Similarly, if your KPI was to create a ‘digital concierge’ service on Twitter for your hospitality brand, you might use the Thank You Score as a metric to help you determine a return.

By measuring how many times customers thank you on social media, you are able to gauge how well you are meeting your KPIs. A customer might come to you with a question and simply thank you for answering. Or, a customer may come to you with a complaint. By setting your goal to ‘receiving a thank you’, your social customer service staff can aim to end the conversations that started in complaint with a thank you. The Thank You Score is not only a great way of improving online customer service, but acts as a measurable metric for defining ROI.

I went back through my direct messages on Twitter and found every time a brand earned my thank you (let's hope they were using the Thank You Score as a reporting metric, ey.)

The Thank You Score is a perfect example of how ROI does not always have to be monetised. In fact, measuring sub standard metrics such as the amount of times customers say thank you, for example, helps to prove your KPIs were met and ROI achieved.

So, if your brand is currently providing customer service through the likes of Twitter and Facebook, educate your staff on the ‘Thank You Score’. This will not not only help improve services and customer experience, but will also help define an aspect of your ROI.